Severnaya Zemlya


Severnaya Zemlya is a archipelago in the Russian high Arctic. It lies off Siberia's Taymyr Peninsula, separated from the mainland by the Vilkitsky Strait. This archipelago separates two marginal seas of the Arctic Ocean, the Kara Sea in the west and the Laptev Sea in the east.
Severnaya Zemlya was first discovered in 1913 and first charted in 1930-1932, making it the last sizeable archipelago on Earth to be discovered and mapped. Administratively, the islands form part of Russia's Krasnoyarsk Krai. In Soviet times there were a number of research stations in different locations, but currently there are no human inhabitants in Severnaya Zemlya, except for the Prima Polar Station near Cape Baranov.
The largest glacier in the Russian Federation, the Academy of Sciences Glacier, is located in Severnaya Zemlya. Until recently, ice joined the islands to Eurasia, even at its smallest extent during the late summer melt season, blocking the Northeast Passage between the Atlantic and the Pacific. By the late summer of 2012, however, due to Arctic sea ice decline the permanent ice had reached a record low extent and open water appeared to the south of the archipelago.

History

Although Severnaya Zemlya lies not far off the northern coast of Siberia, cartographers did not formally record it until the 20th century. Earlier explorers deemed that there was a land mass in the general area - note for example the report by Matvei Gedenschtrom and Yakov Sannikov made in 1810 at the time of their exploration of the New Siberian Islands.
Later in the 19th century, Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld during the Vega expedition sailed very close to this land in 1878 but did not notice it. In 1882, the Danish Arctic explorer and naval officer Andreas Peter Hovgaard, leader of the Arctic survey Dijmphna expedition, set himself the goal of discovering land north of Cape Chelyuskin and exploring the unknown northeastern limits of the Kara Sea. However, Hovgaard was prevented from accomplishing his objectives after having become trapped in thick ice, and his expedition was unable to reach even the shores of the Taymyr Peninsula.
Even at the end of the 19th century, both Nansen's Fram expedition of 1895 and Eduard Toll's Russian polar expedition of 1900–02 on the ship Zarya failed to note any traces of land to the north of the strait between the Kara Sea and the Laptev Sea that they navigated.

Emperor Nicholas II Land

The archipelago first appeared on the map with the 1913-1915 Arctic Ocean Hydrographic Expedition of the icebreakers Taimyr and Vaigach. The chief organiser and first captain of the Vaygach was officer Aleksandr Vasiliyevich Kolchak of the Imperial Russian Navy. The expedition, privately financed, was launched in 1910 and led by Boris Vilkitsky on behalf of the Russian Hydrographic Service. This venture accomplished its goal of exploring the uncharted areas of the continental side of the Northern Sea Route.
On 3 September 1913, members of Vilkitsky's expedition landed on what is now known as Cape Berg on present-day October Revolution Island. They raised the Russian flag on the shore and named the new territory Tayvay Land, after the first syllable of each of their icebreakers' names. During the days that followed, Vilkitsky's expedition charted parts of the Laptev Sea coast of what they believed to be a single island. Barely six months later, in early 1914, by order of the Secretary of the Imperial Navy, the new discovery was renamed Emperor Nicholas II Land, after the ruling Emperor Nicholas II of Russia.

Later exploration and present era

In 1926, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR renamed the still not fully-explored land Severnaya Zemlya. In May 1928, Umberto Nobile and his crew in the Airship Italia attempted to overfly the islands, but adverse weather conditions forced them to turn southward when only an hour or two from viewing the archipelago's coastline.
In the spring of 1931, Georgy Ushakov, accompanied by the geologist Nikolay Urvantsev, the veteran surveyor Sergei Zhuravlev, and the radio-operator Vasily Khodov, thoroughly surveyed Severnaya Zemlya during a two-year expedition to the archipelago. Ushakov and his team established a small base at Golomyanny – the western end of Sredniy Island, off October Revolution Island's western coast. From there they made multiple surveying-trips into the interior and to the coastlines of the larger islands. The first detailed map drawn by the expedition's cartographers showed Severnaya Zemlya divided into four main islands. Geographic features of the territory were named after communist organisations, events, and personalities. With reference to Severnaya Zemlya Ushakov wrote:
The Graf Zeppelin flew over the area during its polar flight of July 1931 and recorded some cartographic and meteorological data; Hugo Eckener tried to take pictures of the yet unsurveyed western coast, but it was obscured by fog and clouds.
Although German communists had endured suffering under the Third Reich, due to anti-German sentiment caused by the 1941-1945 German-Soviet War in the USSR some features of Severnaya Zemlya that had been previously named in solidarity with German Communism were given Russian or neutral-sounding names, e.g. Cape Unslicht becoming Mys Peschanyy and Proliv Yungshturm becoming Yuny Strait.
During the period of the Cold War, the islands of Severnaya Zemlya continued to be studied by a team of geologists from NIIGA in St. Petersburg,. Between 1948 and 1954 a comprehensive geological map was compiled under B. Kh. Egiazarov. Also more accurate maps were drawn by means of cartographic data gathered from aerial-photography surveys.
Administratively, Severnaya Zemlya formed part of the Taymyr Autonomous Okrug until this okrug was merged into Krasnoyarsk Krai on 1 January 2007. it belongs to the Taymyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District of Krasnoyarsk Krai. There has been a request at the Krasnoyarsk Krai Legislative Assembly to reinstate the former name of Severnaya Zemlya as "Emperor Nicholas II Land". This request, however, has been rejected by the local government for the time being.

Geography

Severnaya Zemlya comprises four major islands – October Revolution, Bolshevik, Komsomolets, and Pioneer – and around 70 smaller islands, covering a total area of about. It is separated from the Taymyr Peninsula by the Vilkitsky Strait. Komsomolets is separated from Canada's northernmost point, Cape Columbia, by under 2000 km.
Four of the main islands are largely glaciated, October Revolution, Komsomolets, and Pioneer, as well as the smaller Schmidt Island at the northwestern limit. The glacierised area on Bolshevik, the southernmost main island of the group, covers about a quarter of its land's surface. The southmost point of Severnaya Zemlya is Cape Neupokoyev at the SW end of Bolshevik Island. The highest point of the archipelago is Mount Karpinsky, the summit of the Karpinsky Glacier, an ice dome on October Revolution Island. The Red Army Strait separates Komsomolets Island from October Revolution Island and the broader Shokalsky Strait Bolshevik Island from October Revolution Island. Both straits connect the Kara Sea in the west with the Laptev Sea in the east.
This archipelago encloses the northern limits of the Kara Sea on its western shores, together with Novaya Zemlya, located roughly to the southwest. The large rivers Ob and Yenisei, among others, flow from the south into this marginal sea area of the Arctic Ocean, with their abundant waters contributing to a climate with relatively high precipitation despite the prevalent extreme cold temperatures of the high latitude. The Laptev Sea, where the mighty Lena River steadily expands its large delta, lies to the east of Severnaya Zemlya. The topographic relief of the archipelago is quite smooth, with Neoproterozoic and Palaeozoic sedimentary successions dominating its bedrock geology.

Glaciers

Glaciers in the archipelago have a characteristic dome shape with a continuously decreasing surface towards their edges. Ice cliffs are found only at the base. The places where the glaciers reach the sea contribute to the formation of icebergs. The most active glacier fronts are the eastern side of the Academy of Sciences Glacier at Krenkel Bay as well as its southern side. Another quite active glacier is the Rusanov Glacier on the island of October Revolution with its terminus at Matusevich Fjord.
October Revolution, with seven glaciers, is the island with most individual glaciers in Severnaya Zemlya. Next are the islands of Bolshevik with six, Komsomolets with four, Pioneer with two and Schmidt Island with one. The largest glacier is the Academy of Sciences Glacier in Komsomolets, which is also the largest ice cap of Russia —a and thick ice dome reaching above sea level covering about two-thirds of the surface of the island.

Main islands

October Revolution

is the largest island of the Severnaya Zemlya group in the Russian Arctic.
The area of this island has been estimated at making it the 59th largest island in the world. It rises to a height of on Mount Karpinsky. Half the island is covered with glaciers reaching down into the sea. In the sections free from ice, the vegetation is desert or tundra. The island was first explored and named by the expedition of G.A. Ushakov and Nikolay N. Urvantsev in 1930-32.
October Revolution Island houses five domed ice caps; clockwise from north, they are named: Rusanov, Karpinsky, University, Vavilov and Albanov. The Vavilov Meteorological Station was operated from 1974 to 1988 on the northern part of the Vavilov Ice Cap. Other minor ice caps on the island include the Mal'yutka Glacier. The Podemnaya River and the Bolshaya River drain to the northwest between the Vavilov and Albanov glaciers, and the Bedovaya and Obryvistaya Rivers drain to the north between Albanov and Rusanov. The largest lake of the island and the entire archipelago, Fiordovoye, is located on the southwestern edge of the Karpinsky glacier. To the east and south of the island are the large Matusevich Fjord and the smaller Marat Fjord. They, together with the lake, encircle the Karpinsky ice cap. Cape October is located in the northern part of the island facing the Red Army Strait.
Ostrov Vysokiy is an islet located in a small bay on October Revolution Island's southwest shores.